


Rose in the Glass

by DownToTheSea



Category: Good Omens (TV)
Genre: (but he's still Soft), Abuse, Adventure, Alternate Universe - Fairy Tale, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Asexual Relationship, Fluff and Angst, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Abuse, It's about the tenderness, Monster!Crowley, Mutual Pining, Other
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-12
Updated: 2020-08-13
Packaged: 2021-03-03 23:40:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 9
Words: 18,923
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24674011
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DownToTheSea/pseuds/DownToTheSea
Summary: Aziraphale never looked for adventure in the great wide somewhere; all he wanted was to read his books in peace. But when he stumbles upon an enchanted castle in the middle of the forest, he discovers more adventure than he ever could have bargained for: talking candelabras and clocks, an old curse, and a prince who isn’t nearly as beastly as he appears.
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 50
Kudos: 83
Collections: Aspec-friendly Good Omens





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> HUGE, MASSIVE THANK YOUS to three AWESOME LOVELY people: my beta notmyyacht, DarlingDearheart (who suggested the story idea in the first place!) and janetcarter; this fic has been a long time in the writing (I started it last July!) and I would never have finished it without all of you, thank you so so much <333
> 
> This is a WIP, but the draft is completed and I have a fair chunk of it fully edited, so at the moment I'm planning to post updates weekly! I know there are probably a million other Beauty and the Beast AUs out there by now haha, but I loved writing this fic a lot and I hope someone else enjoys it too! <3

_ Once upon a time, in a faraway land, a handsome prince lived in a shining castle. _

_ Though the prince could be kind, he was more often cruel, for such is the way of humanity. He ruled his kingdom heedlessly, and loved nothing more than to spread mischief among his people. _

_ One night, during a fierce thunderstorm, an old woman came to his door and begged for shelter. _

_ "What will you give me in return?" asked the prince with a wicked smile. _

_ The old woman produced a single rose. "Only this, my lord; it is all I have." _

_ But the prince only took it and cast it upon the floor, where its petals bled crimson into the stones. _

_ He scoffed. "Have you nothing of value? For I have gardens rich and plenty of my own, and have no need of your shriveled weeds." _

_ "Your gardens thrive while your kingdom suffers, lord," said the old woman. "If we have naught to give, the blame lies at your door." _

_ At this, the prince grew enraged. "What!" he cried. "Am I to be schooled so on the threshold of my own castle? Begone!" _

_ "Stay a moment," the old woman commanded as he made to shut the door, and his hands obeyed against his will. _

_ "Will you spurn your kingdom, then?" she asked. "Go among them only to spread chaos, and turn them away when they have need of you?" _

_ "Why should I not?" the prince hissed. "You say I spread chaos, but in truth I only wish to see what they will do. And they are capable of such horrors, old woman: far beyond anything I could dream up. Why do they deserve my help?" _

_ "You would not offer them mercy, or guide them to a better path?" she asked sadly. "For they are capable of greatness, too." _

_ "My people will have to better themselves without me," the prince said in a cold voice. _

_ "Very well," said the old woman, for she saw all the love in his heart had been choked away until none remained. _

_ A great light shone all about her, melting away her disguise and revealing her as a great and powerful enchantress. The prince shrank before her as she advanced on him, her hand lifted, terrible magic being wrought before her. _

_ The doors slammed shut, and the prince was never seen again. _

_ The enchantress transformed the handsome prince into a hideous beast, and placed a powerful spell on the castle and all who lived there. Ashamed of his new and monstrous form, the prince concealed himself within his castle, with a magic mirror as his only window to the outside world. _

_ But the rose she had offered was truly an enchanted rose. If he could learn to love another and earn their love in return by the time the last petal fell, then the spell would be broken. If not, he would be doomed to remain cursed for all time. _

_ As the years passed, he fell into despair, and lost all hope. For who could ever learn to love a beast? _

Some time later, a bookshop owner came across this tale in an old, dusty volume. He found himself oddly captivated by it, and was inordinately disappointed when he reached the end and discovered the story had no resolution.

"Quite irritating," muttered A. Fell, Proprietor, and pushed the volume aside with a huff. "Quite irritating indeed!"

He took a sip of his tea, and attempted to forget about the unfinished story in the old book, but his thoughts kept returning to it over the course of the day. In fact, he didn't succeed in forgetting about it until a full week had passed.

Later events conspired to make him remember again, though by that time he had much larger concerns.

But that is a tale of its own.


	2. Aziraphale

It was a little town; a village, really, and as quiet as Aziraphale's retiring heart could have desired. If it had ever had a name, no one remembered it now, because no one ever ventured far enough away to call it anything but "town."

From this it should be clear that the locals were not, by and large, over-burdened with imagination. This suited Aziraphale's purposes well, since people with imagination might want to actually buy some of the books he had "for sale" in his shop.

Selling books was the last thing Aziraphale wanted to do. His bookshop existed primarily as storage space for his collection: an extensive and impressive collection, considering his less-than-ideal financial situation, and the only thing in the world he truly loved.

Once upon a time his parents had been merchants: extremely (excessively, in his mind) wealthy and influential ones, but a tempest on the high seas and a fleet of once-proud ships now rotting at the bottom of the ocean had stripped away all their wealth. Eventually, they were forced to move here, to this poor provincial town, and live out the remainder of their days. Aziraphale's only real inheritance was his beloved books. When times grew hard, he would muster up his courage and say farewell to one of his precious volumes with a savoring reread and a final tender stroke of its spine. Then he would make the day-long trek to the nearby city and sell it.

Apart from these occasional trips, nothing ever really happened to him. Aziraphale quite preferred it this way. If things  _ happened, _ then he wouldn't be able to spend all day tucked away in his shop reading, which was a very unacceptable concept.

But rarely, during the changing of the seasons, a strange longing ache would sidle into his heart; an awareness of time passing him by while he stayed in his shop and read. It was at those moments when he felt the urge to do something exciting _ ,  _ something bold _ ,  _ like the heroes and heroines of his stories. Aziraphale thought he would quite like adventure, provided it wasn't nasty or unpleasant or made him late for dinner. But, he would point out to himself, that was rather the point of adventure. And then the moment would pass and he would be a mostly-content bookseller once more.

Unfortunately, his savings were once again growing thin. Aziraphale had reluctantly picked out his next volume to sell: a rare edition of  _ Romeo and Juliet.  _ He was planning to reread it today and leave town the next morning. To that end, he walked through the streets with his nose buried in his book. It would have been nice to skirt obstacles with the skill of long practice, but while Aziraphale had long practice he had never quite mastered the skill part of things: during his journey to the bookshop he ran into five people, knocked over a basket of eggs, said good morning to a duck, bumped into a wall, stepped in a variety of things he would have preferred to avoid, walked straight into the stream running through town (which had the mollifying effect of cleaning his shoes), and finally smacked his nose on the door of his own bookshop.

“He’s a funny one, that Fell,” was murmured wherever he went, and sometimes more than murmured. The duck had been the friendliest creature he greeted that morning; everyone else just ignored him and chuckled behind his back, or outright laughed in his face. Aziraphale tried to concentrate on his book, or at least to feel righteously offended instead of small and miserable and alone, but his cheeks were burning by the time he reached his shop. He was very glad to retreat into peace and quiet for the rest of the day.

_ Romeo and Juliet  _ replenished his spirits, insofar as a tragedy can do so, and he locked the door behind him as the sun began to sink over the horizon with his good humor restored. Until he saw who was waiting for him.

Gabriel was insufferably rich, insufferably handsome, and generally insufferable. The rest of town worshipped him, but he had been a thorn in Aziraphale’s side ever since discovering he came from an old Family, capital letter and all. He seemed to think the two of them quite above the Common Folk, and himself quite above Aziraphale.

“Aziraphale!” he greeted, plastering on one of his huge, empty smiles. “Imagine running into you here.”

Aziraphale’s answering smile was a trifle stiff. “This is my bookshop?”

Gabriel waved his hand. “But with your hours, you never know when it’s going to be open! Isn’t that right, Sandalphon?” He turned to the shorter person next to him, seeking agreement.

Sandalphon was always happy to provide it. “Right enough.”

“Well, I’m terribly sorry if you were looking for a book,” said Aziraphale, not sorry at all. “I’m afraid I’ll be out of town for the rest of the week, but you’re welcome to come back next week.”  _ Please don’t,  _ he added mentally, and offered a jerky sort of nodding bow before attempting an escape.

Gabriel jogged into his path, forcing him to stop short. “Sorry, Az – do you mind if I call you Az?”

_ Yes,  _ was what Aziraphale wanted to say, but he didn’t. Besides being the handsomest and the richest, Gabriel was also the most powerful person in town.

“I suppose it could be worse,” Sandalphon chortled. “You could call him  _ Fail!” _

Gabriel looked delighted. “Oh, that is, that is brilliant!” He clapped Aziraphale on the back, hard enough to send him stumbling a step, and guffawed along with Sandalphon. “Fail!”

“Anyway, Az,” he said, sobering. “I wasn’t looking to buy a book. I wanted to talk to you.”

“Talk – talk to me? What – ” Aziraphale stopped himself from saying “whatever for?” in the nick of time, but thankfully Gabriel rolled on without noticing.

“It’s a shame for you to waste away in that shop of yours, selling… things. Seems a bit  _ peasant,  _ you know? You and I, Aziraphale,” here he clapped Aziraphale on the back again, eliciting a wince, “we’re meant for something  _ better.  _ Don’t you agree?”

“Er, I don’t – ”

“Exactly! I know what happened to your family – very tragic and all – but your name still carries a lot of weight, you know. Imagine what we could do if our houses were joined! Imagine what  _ I  _ could do!”

Aziraphale stared blankly, not sure he was comprehending Gabriel’s meaning.

“Are you, are you proposing,” he stammered, going redder by the second, and Gabriel’s smile widened.

“Just think about it, alright?” Before Aziraphale could say anything, Gabriel had plucked the book out of his hands. “Romeo and Juliet. Is that one of the funny ones? The romantic ones?”

“It’s – it’s – ” said Aziraphale, who had unfortunately forgotten most of the words he desperately wanted to use right now. Not all of them would have been quite civil.

Gabriel flipped through the pages, nearly tearing them in his carelessness; Aziraphale’s heart lurched up into his throat at seeing the reckless way he was handling it.

“Huh. Well, that’s all well and good, but remember Aziraphale, the world – ” He swept his hand in a wide, all-encompassing motion. “It’s not like your books. Romance isn’t for people like us. We have to be pragmatists. Set our aims higher than silly little love affairs and whatnot.”

“I don’t think they’re silly,” Aziraphale dared to say, with the hint of a real smile. “I think they’re rather lovely.”

Gabriel snapped the book shut with a  _ clap  _ that made him flinch. “Aww, isn’t that sweet,” he said to Sandalphon, before pointing at Aziraphale. “I hope you’re not holding out too much hope, Az. You really think someone’s going to want  _ you?  _ A dusty, bumbling shopkeeper who hasn’t changed his bowtie in ten years? Or were you hoping no one would notice if you just kept your face in a book all the time?” He laughed.

“Good one,” put in Sandalphon.

“It was, wasn’t it?” Gabriel tossed the book aside. Aziraphale let out a strangled cry and dove after it, retrieving it from the mud and wiping off the cover as best he could. “Just consider my offer, Aziraphale. You won’t get a better one.”

He and Sandalphon strode off, leaving Aziraphale kneeling in the mud with a stained book clutched in his trembling hands.


	3. Through the Mist, Through the Woods

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CROWLEY APPEARS!
> 
> As always a million thank yous to my awesome beta notmyyacht! <3

“Can you imagine?” Aziraphale vented later to his bookshelves at home, pacing back and forth in his small cottage. He let out a frustrated exhale. “What a ridiculous idea. I’d rather sell all of my books before marrying him.” The thought of selling  _ all  _ of them was too painful to consider for long, so he quickly amended it. “Well, almost all my books. What nonsense!”

Aziraphale stayed up late into the night, cleaning and drying  _ Romeo and Juliet _ , and working himself up over the encounter with Gabriel. Thankfully, the book hadn't suffered too irreparable damage, although he despaired at getting the mud stains on the edges out. Even after he had done all he could for it _ ,  _ he was so distressed that he had to make himself a cup of tea and force himself to sit down before he could begin to relax.

The next day, he saddled his horse Rosalind, packed  _ Romeo and Juliet  _ lovingly into a satchel, and set out on his way.

For a while time passed uneventfully, even pleasantly; the early autumn sun shone bright on the forest, still vibrant with the last fragments of summer, and birds sang in the trees. Aziraphale spent most of the ride reading another book and trusting Rosalind to know the road, packing the book away only to munch on a sandwich he had brought along as a snack.

This was just as well, because soon after there was a ferocious boom of thunder overhead, and the clouds burst into pouring rain on Aziraphale’s head.

“Better me than the books, better me than the books,” he chanted to himself as water soaked him, dripping down his collar and stinging his eyes. In the downpour, it was difficult to make out the path in front of him, and he had to guess a few times which turn to nudge Rosalind down.

He had halted at the middle of one such fork, hand shielding his eyes from the worst of the rain while he peered down each road, when a jagged bolt of lightning blazed down directly in front of him.

Aziraphale jolted back in his seat with a cry. The lightning was gone in a flash, but it had struck a tree right in his path, and despite the heavy rain the tree had burst into flame. While he tried to calm Rosalind, it toppled over and crashed down onto the wider of the two paths, blocking it completely.

“Oh, dear,” said Aziraphale, because he had been fairly certain that was the correct one. “Well, nothing for it now. I’m sure it’ll join up later…” Twitching the reins, he guided Rosalind down the path on the right, a narrow uneven thing. Rosalind resisted, but Aziraphale dug his heels in with an apologetic air.

“Very sorry, dear girl, but I promise there will be a nice bag of oats in it for you when we’ve arrived, hmm?”

Rosalind tossed her head, still not convinced, but eventually she allowed herself to be coaxed onto the trail, taking mincing little steps at first before settling back into a more normal, if still wary, pace. Aziraphale could hardly blame her. This was not a very inviting section of forest. The trees grew stranger as they progressed, contorting into twisted shapes with branches stretching over the path like bony, clutching fingers. The rain stopped, but the temperature was falling, and soon Aziraphale was shivering and wishing he had brought a heavier coat.

He wrapped his arms around himself as it became colder and colder. Still, he was surprised when Rosalind’s hooves crunched against snow. In  _ August?  _ No sooner had he thought that than a few fat flakes swirled through the air and landed on his cheeks.

“Something very strange is going on,” he murmured, but he didn’t turn back.

The trees encroached more and more on the path, until it was less a path and more the suggestion of one, winding around in rambling curves. The snow was falling faster and piling up on the ground, and Aziraphale spotted the sheen of ice clinging to branches. Wherever he was, this place hadn’t seen summer in a long time.

He was beginning to think he should turn back after all, and was only a moment away from pulling Rosalind to a stop, when a shrill noise pierced the air around him. A wolf howling – close. It was answered in kind by more voices taking up the call, surrounding him. His blood went cold.

“Oh dear,” he said again, and that was all he had time for before a wolf sprang out of the brush and lunged.

Rosalind didn’t need any encouragement to take off at a dead run. She galloped through the trees, Aziraphale clinging on for dear life. His teeth rattled as he was jolted up and down and around, as Rosalind careened around trees, ignoring the path in favor of a direct line away from the wolves. More had jumped out of the forest and joined the pursuit: a full pack, all of them snapping and slavering entirely too close for Aziraphale’s comfort. He urged Rosalind to go faster, not wanting to discover how those unpleasantly large teeth would feel clamped around his leg.

The horse’s strength was beginning to lag; the wolves closed in. One jumped up and snapped at Aziraphale. He ducked aside, but it managed to snag the satchel at his hip, the one containing  _ Romeo and Juliet.  _ The teeth caught and ripped the bag away, and it landed in a snowdrift a few feet away.

Aziraphale let out a little cry of horror, already being carried out of reach. He craned his neck to look back, but the book had disappeared from his line of sight, hidden behind a fallen trunk.

When he turned back, a high wrought-iron fence loomed in front of him out of the trees. It didn’t look any more welcoming than the forest had, with its bars twisted in writhing serpentine forms and a snarling gargoyle perched atop the gate. But, miraculously, the gate was open, and Rosalind darted through.

She reared to a halt, allowing Aziraphale to slide awkwardly off her back and slam the gate shut behind them – hardly a moment too soon, as a wolf crashed into it a split second afterwards. Its snout brushed Aziraphale through the bars before he stumbled away, a rush of displaced air against his neck as it made one last grab at him.

Aziraphale tumbled to his knees once he was a safe distance away, taking in heaving breaths and trying to compose himself. Rosalind nudged him: gently, but impatiently, as if to say “Get on my back and let’s get to an even safer distance, and by the way you still owe me oats.” At last, he was able to struggle up and continue on.

They were on the grounds of a massive, forgotten ruin of an estate. Neat paths dipped in between hedges and statues and gardens, endless gardens, all covered in snow. A castle rose before them, vast and many-turreted, decorated in the same unpleasant style as the gate. Aziraphale looked around, frowning. He had studied a multitude of maps, of this country and other farther-off places he wasn’t brave enough to go. Yet he had seen nothing whatsoever about any kind of castle or mansion in this area.

He pulled on the reins as they approached the castle, getting Rosalind to slow and then stop. Eyes wide with fear, wonder, and curiosity, he stared up at the castle, which seemed even more huge and imposing now that he was next to it. This close, he could see that the gargoyles and serpents were joined by angels, perching on balconies and inlaid into walls. It seemed an odd contrast, until he passed one at ground level and jerked back. The angel’s face was twisted into a scream of horror and pain, and parts of it were crumbling and blackened. Aziraphale could have put this down to age and wear, if not for the carved flames creeping up the angel’s side. It looked like it was burning alive.

He swallowed. “Rather grim decor!” he said with forced brightness.

They reached a stable, where Aziraphale dismounted and led Rosalind in. “I suppose I should pay a call on the owner, you know, thank them for unintentionally saving me.”

This seemed the polite thing to do, which was part of why Aziraphale meant to do it. However, he was also brimming with curiosity to find out what this strange castle was and why it didn’t appear in any records. So after Rosalind was settled, he ascended the stone steps and knocked tentatively on the massive front doors.

They swung open immediately.

“Oh, thank y–” He stopped mid-word, seeing there was no one in the entryway. How odd. Perhaps the door had been left open a bit, and his knocking had dislodged it. (He ignored the fact that the doors were far too heavy for this to be the case.)

“Hello?” he called, stepping in. It wasn’t a great deal warmer here than it was outside, although he could catch glimpses of firelight flickering off walls and corridors deeper inside. “Is anyone here?”

The sound of a chair being scraped across the floor made him jump. It came from a room just off the main entry, with wide double doors which were mostly pulled shut. A merry fire blazed within.

“Oh, hello!” he said as he made his way gratefully towards it. “I can’t tell you how glad I am…”

He trailed off again. There was no one inside the room. It was carpeted in plush red, the windows opening out onto the grounds. A wonderfully soft and comfortable-looking chair sat by the crackling fire, and there was a fully outfitted tea service on a rolling cart nearby, with a fresh cup steaming on a saucer.

“Oh,” said Aziraphale. “Er, thank you!” he called loudly. “I’m terribly sorry to have disturbed you. Thank you for the tea. I’ll just warm up for a bit and then be off.”

He made his way into the room, picking up the tea and sinking into the chair with a sigh. “Must be very shy, whoever lives here,” he speculated to the tea.

It should be noted here that Aziraphale had a habit of talking to whichever inanimate object happened to be closest to him. He did not, as a rule, expect to be  _ answered  _ by the inanimate object.

“He is a little shy, I reckon,” said the teacup.

Aziraphale froze. He hoped, very much, that the cold or the terror from being chased by wolves was playing tricks on his imagination.

“But he’s not so bad once you get used to him,” the teacup continued.

Aziraphale let out a small shriek. He slammed the teacup back down on the saucer, china clattering, and jumped up.

“Thank you! Goodbye!” he shouted as he bolted for the door. “I’m going now, I promise not to – to ever come back! Thank you!”

The chill air outside hit him in a blast, but he gritted his teeth and waded through it, retrieving Rosalind from the stables and swinging onto her as fast as he possibly could.

“We have to get out of here,” he told the horse wildly, casting a panicked look over his shoulder. “Quickly!”

Rosalind took off. Neither of them knew the layout of the grounds, and Aziraphale realized a moment later that they were on a different path than the one they had taken to get to the castle.

It didn’t matter. Nothing mattered so long as he could simply escape this nightmare and go back to his books. Aziraphale cursed himself for ever once wanting adventure. Adventure was terrible, and frightening, and dreadful! All he wanted was a good cup of tea – that didn’t talk to him! – and a good book, and a warm fire.

Rosalind turned a corner, into yet another garden. But this one wasn’t empty, vacant like the others from the unseasonable winter and heaps of snow. Trellises filled the massive space, roses of every imaginable color growing on them, twining through each other and jewel-bright against the snow. It was beautiful; as frightened as he was, Aziraphale could appreciate that. But of more immediate concern was the young woman at the far end of the garden.

She had fallen to the ground, backing away on her hands as quickly as she could from the shadowed archway that led out of the rose garden. Aziraphale couldn’t see whatever she was looking at, only a glimpse of movement from the archway’s depths, but the expression on her face told him it was something to be terrified of. Perhaps he was braver than he realized, because without thinking he dismounted and ran over to her, offering her a hand out of the snow.

“Get away!” she cried, waving him back. “Run!”

This close, there was no mistaking her rounded stomach, which only steeled Aziraphale’s resolve to help. “Why, what is the matter?” he started to ask, before he followed her frightened gaze to the archway’s shadows once more. He jumped back with a cry.

Yellow eyes shone at him from out of the darkness.

“What the _matter_ is,” said a voice, a sharp, acidic voice, dripping with malice, “is that this young woman is a thief, and must be punished.”

“I’m not a thief!” retorted the young woman.

“Then what are you holding?”

She and Aziraphale both looked down, where in her trembling fingers she held a red rose.

“It’s just a rose,” she said, voice faltering. “I was passing through the garden, and it was so beautiful… It’s such a small thing.”

“Just a rose,” laughed the voice.  _ “My  _ punishment for a rose was eternal damnation; just think of this as spreading the fun around.”

“Now wait just a moment,” Aziraphale interjected, but the voice overrode his protests.

“You’ll spend the rest of your life in my dungeons,” it said, almost bored now, and a figure detached itself from the shadows, slithering out into the open. Aziraphale gasped, taking an involuntary step back.

It – he? – was mostly human-shaped, but covered in scales. Most of them were a deep, bloody crimson, with sooty greyish-black streaked over some, almost as though they had been singed just like the angels’ wings at the castle. Around the scales’ edges, patches of waxy skin stood out here and there in stark contrast, and open wounds oozed blood into a blackened crust: like the scales hadn’t merged quite right with the skin, and they were cutting into it. A shock of fiery red hair fell over slitted yellow eyes, eyes that flared for a moment with unearthly light before returning to smoldering embers.

Long obsidian claws gleamed on his hands. He was dressed all in black, and for a moment Aziraphale thought he was simply wearing a terribly lumpy, misshapen coat, but then he realized that a pair of wings was folded up rigidly on the creature’s back: tattered and bent and ripped in so many places they couldn’t possibly be flightworthy.

He seized the woman’s arm and dragged her back along the garden path, ignoring her attempts to free herself. “Alright, come on. The dungeon’s quite cozy once you get used to it, really.”

“Wait!” cried Aziraphale. “Stop!”

The creature paused, his head turning slightly to fix one burning eye on Aziraphale. “What?” he asked, annoyed. “Shouldn’t you be getting on your way? I’m sure the wolves have gone by now.” A wicked grin split his face, exposing sharp fangs that glinted in the failing winter light. “Mostly gone.”

“I – well, it’s – it’s just that, locking someone away forever seems a tad excessive, don’t you think?” tried Aziraphale.

“Definitely excessive,” the woman agreed shakily.

The creature – the demon – whatever it was, turned back to him fully, indicating himself with one clawed hand. “Hello? Did you miss the ‘eternal damnation’ bit? I was pretty proud of that line, I admit, but I’m not saying it again. Ruins the impact.”

“Er. No, I remember that part. It’s just…” Aziraphale gestured helplessly, trying to think of a delicate way to phrase his next argument. “She’s… she’s…  _ expecting,  _ for heaven’s sake! Can’t you show a little pity?”

This was met with another cruel smile. “Pity? That’s not the way this works. But if you feel that strongly about it, you’re more than welcome to take her place.” He turned away again.

Aziraphale’s mouth opened and closed. He knew what he  _ should  _ do. He knew what he  _ wanted  _ to do. He wanted to go home. He wanted to curl up underneath a nest of blankets and never go out into the wide world again. He wanted to read his books in safety, and cling to the scraps of happiness he eked out of life.

But that woman, and her baby… It wasn’t right that they should be locked away for eternity. She was so young! And maybe there was someone out there waiting for her, or maybe more children. Aziraphale, on the other hand… No one would miss him, he realized a little bitterly. No one but his books, and as much as he loved them, he couldn’t place his own comfort over the well-being of others. He  _ couldn’t. _

So, his entire body quivering with sheer terror, he opened his mouth. He had to try three times before he got the words out, but he managed it eventually.

“W–Wait!” he called again. “I’ll do it.”

The monster stopped in his tracks. His fingers went slack around the woman’s arm, and she scrambled away from him. He whirled to stare at Aziraphale with wide, startled yellow eyes.

“You  _ what?” _

“I said I’ll do it.” Aziraphale’s voice gave way, but in a sudden burst of rebellious courage, he seized the nearest rose and wrenched it free. This one was white, with the tiniest hint of crimson creeping in at the edges of the petals. “You want to punish a rose thief, don’t you? Well, here I am.”

“Well,” said the demon, sounding rather nonplussed. “There you are.”

Silence descended over the garden. For a long moment they all stood there staring at each other, shocked into inaction. Aziraphale felt his teeth begin to chatter.

“Right!” the creature said, apparently coming back to his senses. “Best get on with it then. Run along,” he said, nodding to the woman.

She looked between him and Aziraphale. “I’m so sorry,” she told Aziraphale wretchedly. “I’ll find someone, I’ll get help for you – ”

_ “Now!”  _ The voice reverberated through the grounds.

Casting one last horrified look at Aziraphale, she turned and ran out of the garden.

Aziraphale swallowed once the demon's attention turned to him and he closed the distance between them, moving with a sort of slithering stalk. His eyes shut involuntarily as he saw one hand come up, claws gleaming, but the mortal wound he had been expecting never came. Fingers closed around his arm, tight but not painfully so, and if he hadn't known better he would have said the creature was trying to avoid scratching him.

Aziraphale opened his eyes to find the unreadable sulphurous gaze locked on his. A tiny whimper of fear escaped him, and the monster looked away.

"Come on," he hissed. "Time to show you to your new home."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A quick note: this is based primarily on the 90s animated film, but some of the live-action version is mixed in along with a little of the original fairy tale. (And a decent chunk of it it just me making things up XD)


	4. Be Our Guest

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always, many thanks to my awesome beta notmyyacht!

Aziraphale stumbled along in the demon’s wake, the reality of what he had just done only now beginning to sink in. His legs trembled so that he could hardly walk. The monster kept having to stop and let him catch up, making irritated little sibilant noises.

“Can’t you go any faster?” he asked. “It’s hardly a warm summer’s day out here, y'know.”

“It  _ was  _ a warm summer’s day when I left this afternoon,” Aziraphale retorted. He tried to sound brave and strong, and perhaps a little dangerous, but it came out high-pitched and terrified. “And forgive me if I’d prefer to savor my last moments under the sun!”

“There’s no sun here,” said the demon, an odd note in his voice. “Not ever. Is it summer outside, then?”

Aziraphale said nothing; his throat was too tight. His mouth wobbled. He was very close to breaking down in tears on the spot, and was rather tempted to give in and do so, if only to annoy the creature in front of him.

Rosalind, trailing after them, nuzzled his arm and whickered softly. For a moment Aziraphale wondered if he could convince the beast to set her free at least, but he remembered the wolves howling, and shivered. Then again, maybe the wolves would be preferable to this creature.

“What are you going to do to her?” he quavered.

“Wh– Oh, your horse? Er, put her in the stables and have someone look after her?” The demon looked perplexed. “What else would I do?”

“How should I know?” Aziraphale spluttered, relieved if a bit confused. “You’re a beast! You might do anything – to her or me!”

“Thanks, I hadn’t noticed,” said the creature acerbically. “Now can we get on?”

They ascended the steps again, leaving Rosalind behind. The huge doors seemed even more frightening now that Aziraphale knew what lurked behind them, and he had to look away. Once more his attention was drawn to the statues nearby. The burning angel’s horrified eyes bored into his, and he swallowed.

“Kindred spirit?” the beast drawled.

“What?” Aziraphale squeaked, gaze snapping back to his unwanted companion.

He nodded towards the angel. “You think you’re so noble, don’t you? Sacrificing yourself for that woman. Selfless.  _ Virtuoussssssssss.”  _ This last word came out in a way that could only be described as a very sarcastic hiss.

“It was simply what anyone would have done, under the circumstances,” said Aziraphale, even though he privately thought, deep down, that it  _ had  _ been quite noble of him. Even deeper down, he wished he hadn’t been noble at all.

The beast snorted. “You must not get out much,  _ angel.” _

Aziraphale frowned, unsure whether he had just been insulted, complimented, or both. While he was pondering this, the beast tugged him through the doors. He aimed them towards a narrow side door instead of the corridors where firelight danced farther down, and Aziraphale's heart sank. The dungeons, no doubt.

But instead of a passage downward, the door opened onto a winding staircase that led up and up and up. Slits in the wall provided a glimpse of the grounds outside sinking gradually beneath them. Aziraphale, whose only regular exercise consisted of walking to his bookshop and back at night, was panting by the time they were halfway up. To his surprise, the beast stopped and waited for him to catch his breath.

“It’s, er, a nice view,” Aziraphale said, though he wasn't sure why. Complimenting the scenery wouldn't make the demon let him go.

Another snort was his only answer.

“Do you have a name?”

He could have sunk into the ground the moment the words escaped his mouth. Of  _ course  _ the beast had a name. And if the stories he had read were any indication, asking for magical creatures’ names was a surefire way to end up dead, cursed, and/or seriously regretting one's life choices.

“Why? Most people are satisfied with ‘the beast’ or ‘the monster.’ Or just – ” here he gave a mocking imitation of a shrill scream. He seemed highly amused by his own joke, but Aziraphale wasn’t. Not in the slightest.

“Sometimes they get really creative and call me ‘the  _ demon. _ ’ Take your pick. Go with a creative assortment of all three, that’s a popular option.”

Relieved he hadn’t been killed on the spot and feeling a tad defensive because he had, in fact, been mentally doing just that, Aziraphale sniffed. “Well if you didn’t want to tell me, you could have just said so! And I’m Aziraphale; I suppose you should know what my name is, if you’re going to have me as a prisoner forever.”

The beast – yes, all right _ ,  _ perhaps it was a little rude to keep calling him that, but it wasn’t as though he had another option, like a  _ name,  _ and besides the beast was much ruder –  _ the beast,  _ then, coughed and looked away. “Right, you ready to keep going?”

The narrow stair led to an equally narrow passage high in one of the towers. Another glance out a window left Aziraphale’s head spinning, and he had to clutch at the wall to maintain his balance. He had never been this high up in his life; the grounds were laid out beneath him like a map in one of his books, covered in dull white. Beyond them was the greenish-grey blur of forest, and beyond that, a haze settled over the horizon. It appeared he wouldn’t be allowed one last glimpse of his home.

The beast strode halfway down the passage before flinging open a creaking door. Aziraphale stepped closer and peered inside.

It was a cramped room – a cell, really – with a stone floor and stone walls, and very little in the way of furniture or comfort. There was another window at the far wall, much too small to be of any use in escaping. (Plus there was that terrifying drop that made Aziraphale’s stomach clench just  _ thinking  _ about it.) A torch burned feebly on another wall, casting barely enough light to see by.

“This is it?” Aziraphale stepped inside at the beast’s gesture, his voice faint.

“What, were you expecting a grand suite?” asked the monster. “Besides, it’s not as if – ” His mouth clamped shut.

Aziraphale didn’t notice. The entire world seemed to have closed in on this tiny, uncomfortable room. The thin, hard-looking cot, the cold walls. So dim he could hardly see his own hands in front of him, and if the beast spoke the truth then there would never be a sun to illuminate the room further. Not a thing to pass the time – oh, dear God,  _ no books. _

A sob finally rose up in his throat. Tears welled up in his eyes, spilling down his cheeks. No more books, not ever again. No more comfort of any kind. No more staying up nights in his plush armchair reading by candlelight. (Not that his armchair was as plush as it had been twenty or thirty years ago, and it strained his eyes dreadfully to read by the single candle he could afford, but still.) What would happen to his shop? His collection? What would happen to  _ him,  _ spending the rest of his life in this frigid barren cell?

“Hey,” said the creature, sounding oddly upset. “It’s – it’s not that bad, right? You have a, a view and all.” His hand flopped in the general direction of the window.

Aziraphale opened his mouth to argue, but choked on another sob. “Oh…” He leaned against the wall, arms wrapping tightly around himself. His head was pounding. He would have quite liked to just sit down in the dark and cry for a week.

“Well no, I suppose it’s pretty awful,” the demon continued without a response, “but – oh look, it’s only for a few days, alright?”

“What?” Aziraphale barely heard him over the sound of his own heaving breaths.

“Just a few days!” he said desperately. “I’m not actually going to lock you up forever! I was going to leave a door open  _ accidentally _ , and make it seem like you’d just barely escaped, so you would tell everyone outside to avoid this place, and – just please stop crying, it’s like – like watching someone murder a bloody baby unicorn.”

Slowly, Aziraphale loosened his arms and blinked his teary eyes, hardly daring to believe it. "So I’m… free to go?"

"Well," the demon said cautiously, as if trying to avoid provoking Aziraphale into bursting into tears again. "I can't have you running off and telling everyone I'm easy pickings and all. And you did take a rose from my garden. But a few days ought to teach you a lesson, right?"

"Oh yes.” Aziraphale gave an eager nod, voice cracking from relief. “Definitely!”

"All settled then. Three days and you can go. And I’ll… have my staff find you a different room. No use keeping you here if you’re going to keep the whole castle up all night crying, not now that you’ve dashed my whole plan to smithereens," he said gruffly.

Another realization dawned. "You weren't really going to imprison that woman forever either, were you?" Aziraphale asked, still sniffling. It was a bit of a blow to think his heroic sacrifice had been for nothing, but it was vastly preferable to the alternative of spending eternity locked in this tiny cell.

The beast scratched the back of his neck, looking a great deal more embarrassed than any proper beast had the right to look. "Er, well, no. Just wanted to scare her, make sure she wouldn't come back, and spread the word so nobody else’d come around either."

"Oh, that was very wrong of you!" Aziraphale exclaimed.

"Wot?"

"That poor woman! You absolutely  _ terrified  _ her, just to make things more convenient for yourself! And I’m sure it can’t have been good for the baby, either.”

Courage had bubbled up from some heretofore unexplored well inside him. He wasn’t sure if it was shock, or the surrealism of this entire situation, or something else. He would never have dared to argue with anyone like this at home.

The beast’s mouth fell open, letting out a string of noises that Aziraphale would have called stammering on a less frightening being. "Well – no – what was I supposed to do, then? Invite her in to sit by the fire, have a cup of tea, and then send her on her way with a 'oh, d’you want some priceless jewels to go with the rose? I’ve got loads just lying about!'”

“Well it is very expensive to raise a child, and if you do have jewels around I’m sure  _ you  _ don’t need them.”

He glared at Aziraphale. “Word would’ve got out about this place. Enchanted castle in the middle of nowhere, just waiting to be picked over by treasure hunters? I’d have had them all over within a week."

Despite the bluster his mouth was twisting guiltily, and he shifted from foot to foot. Aziraphale concealed a smug smile.

"I'll just – send someone up, then.” Was Aziraphale imagining it, or had the small patches of visible skin on his face turned pink?

He turned to leave, and then spun back. “Oh, and look, it would make things a lot easier if you could tell anyone who asks about this that you suffered a lengthy and brutal imprisonment. Think of it as helping others,  _ angel _ , since it’ll keep them away from me and that’s just better for everyone.”

Aziraphale rolled his eyes, but he had a point. "The lengthy imprisonment part won’t do, since I'll be gone less than a week. But I can certainly tell anyone who asks that I only barely escaped with my life. In fact,” he said, beginning to get rather invested in the dramatic escapades he could give himself, “I should be able to spin quite a tale! Oh, I can include the wolves, that adds a nice touch of action… Maybe I should make them your enthralled servants!" He giggled slightly.

He realized the demon was staring at him with a familiar expression: the same one everyone in town got when he talked with them for more than a few minutes. The "what a very odd fellow" look. Aziraphale felt the old sinking sensation in his stomach, but then the expression smoothed into something… Different. Softer. Just for a moment, before the demon turned away, Aziraphale thought that for perhaps the first time in his life, someone was enjoying listening to him ramble.

“Say whatever you want, just keep people away,” he said roughly. “And… name’s Crowley. Just so you know.”


	5. The Enchanted Castle

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you as always to my fabulous beta notmyyacht!!

Aziraphale tried to get some sleep. After all, it had been a very wearying day. But he was shivering so hard he couldn’t even begin to relax; it was freezing in the tower cell, with wind whistling through chinks in the stone, and it didn’t help that his clothes were still wet from the rain and melted snow from earlier. There was only one thin blanket, and he had that wrapped as tightly around himself as he could.

There was no way to tell how much time had passed. The sky was still that same shade of uninviting slate grey it had been upon his arrival. Apparently the beast, Crowley, had been telling the truth about the sun never rising.

Occupied with these gloomy thoughts, Aziraphale didn’t notice the sounds coming from the passage outside until they were almost at his door. Very odd sounds they were: not footsteps, but sort of jingles and clinks, like something metallic being repeatedly picked up and put down heavily on the stone floor.

Then the voices started.

“So do you think he’s. You know. The one?” asked one voice nervously, in a way that suggested the owner of the voice did most things nervously.

There was a non-committal hum from another voice. “Maybe,” it said. The second voice was female, and did not sound nervous at all. “Though if you want my honest opinion, I think it’s a lost cause at this point.”

“Anathema!” said the first voice, shocked.

“You’ve been here the whole time. You’ve seen every single  _ disastrous  _ attempt we’ve made at getting him to – you know. Thirty years, and all he ever does is yell at visitors and chase them off.”

“To be fair, most of them have tried to kill him.”

“Because he’s intentionally trying to be scary. He’s hopeless.”

“Excuse me,” said Aziraphale, who felt it was high time to remind the voices that yes, he  _ did  _ exist, he was right here. (Though his curiosity was somewhat piqued.) “Are you, er, Mr. Crowley said he would be sending someone to show me to another room?”

Both voices unmistakably giggled. “I guess you could say that,” said the second one, Anathema. “But just Crowley is fine. One moment, please.”

There was some more clanking and the sound of the lock being undone. The door swung open with a groan.

Aziraphale peered out into the corridor, confused. He was beginning to think his entire experience in this castle would be finding emptiness where he expected people.

“Further down,” said Anathema.

Aziraphale looked down, and let out another tiny shriek, jerking back. Instead of the people he had been expecting, a candelabra and a small clock were standing on the threshold. The clock waved up at him.

“You’re – you’re – ”

“Cursed,” said the clock. “Yeah, we know.”

Swallowing, Aziraphale edged closer. The candelabra was wrought in the shape of a young bespectacled woman, gazing up at him with an unimpressed expression. The clock looked like a normal tabletop clock at first glance, but through some cunning design, as he looked closer he could see elements on its face coming together to form the caricature of a human face.

“I’m Anathema Device,” said the candelabra, once it became clear Aziraphale wasn’t going to scream again. “And this is Newt, Newton Pulsifer.”

“You work for the – Mr. – Crowley?”

The clock sighed, and Anathema gave him a not-unkind smirk. “I do,” she said. “I manage the castle and the estate. Newt here was just in the wrong place at the wrong time.”

“Story of my life,” mused the clock, Newton.

“What do you mean?” Aziraphale asked.

“He picked a really bad day to job-hunt,” said Anathema.

“Oh dear. I’m very sorry to hear that.”

“It’s fine,” said the clock glumly. “At least I’ve got a lot of experience for my resume now.”

“Ah,” said Aziraphale, who didn’t quite understand this and whose conversational expertise was quickly running thin.

Blessedly, Anathema cut in. “Come with us. We’ll show you to your new room.”

“Oh, thank you.”

He followed slowly as Anathema and Newton clanked along in front of him, taking him down another, wider flight of stairs at the end of the hall and through a set of passages.

“Do you, erm, mind if I ask…” he began.

“How we were cursed?”

“Well, yes. If it’s no trouble, I mean.”

Anathema shrugged, as much as it was possible for a metal candelabra to shrug. “One minute we’re business-as-usual, the next minute an old woman comes to the door, demands to speak to the prince, and ten minutes later we’re all the very latest in household implements. She had a problem with the way he ran things.”

Aziraphale blinked. “The… the prince?”

She looked back at him. “Crowley. He didn’t mention it? Usually it’s third or fourth on his go-to intimidation tactics.”

That creature was a  _ prince?  _ All of a sudden Aziraphale remembered the story he had read weeks ago. Surely, it wasn’t possible…

He was still musing on this as they descended into the main section of the castle. The corridors opened up here, and there was carpet on the floors, a bit old and ratty but still soft. It was much warmer down here. Paintings and tapestries covered the walls, and all the furniture that Aziraphale could see was ornate and beautifully carved. Clearly, this place had been very fine once upon a time.

Anathema led him down another set of stairs into a long, large passage that opened onto the entrance hall. They ascended the wide staircase at its end, and she paused on the landing, which split off in two directions.

"That's the west wing." She waved a candle to the right. "It's strictly off limits. Pain of death and all that. ...Newt?"

Newton was making an off-key humming noise that was probably supposed to sound spooky. He subsided. "Sorry. Thought it'd add to the atmosphere."

Anathema sighed. "You can go anywhere else in the castle and grounds while you're here.  _ Except the west wing.” _

“Right,” said Aziraphale with a nervous laugh. “Pain of death.” They turned left and he trailed after them through more stairways and corridors. His legs were hurting, and he began to think more kindly of the cell.

Finally, they arrived at another large set of doors. Much smaller than the ones downstairs though, and made of a rich dark wood that was polished to a fine sheen. With some effort, Anathema and Newton pushed them open and stepped aside for Aziraphale to go through.

“Oh my.” He stared around him.

They had taken him to another tower room, but unlike the cell he had been in earlier this spanned the entire width of the tower. The ceiling arched high, high above him, painted in a rich dark blue with glittering points of silver engraving that looked like stars. In fact… Aziraphale tilted his head. They  _ were  _ stars, set precisely in an imitation of the summer night sky’s constellations. The walls lightened to pale blues and purples as they got closer to the floor, like dawn creeping over the horizon, and the rest of the room was done up in the same colors, with pastel coverings and furniture painted a gleaming white. Fresh flowers sat in a glass vase on the bedside table.

“Oh my,” Aziraphale said again. His entire cottage could have fit in this space.

Fire crackled on the hearth, warming Aziraphale’s chilled body, and – his breath caught. On the mantelpiece there was a small stack of  _ books. _

“Thank you,” he said fervently to Anathema. “This is very kind of you.”

“Don’t thank me,” she told him. “Thank Crowley. It’s the best guest room, and his personal favorite.”

Newton sidled closer and muttered out of the corner of his mouth, or the clockwork bits that passed for a mouth. “What happened to  _ lost cause?” _

“Shh.”

Footsteps sounded outside, along with the clinking of china and squeaking of a wheel that needed to be oiled.

_ “Smile,  _ dear,” said a voice, an older woman from the sound of it. “Oh, your fangs, that’s… Perhaps not then.”

“Thanksssss,” came a sarcastic mutter that was clearly Crowley.

“Come on, who doesn’t like fangs?” asked another voice. Aziraphale’s eyes widened. There were  _ children  _ here? Really, he quite wanted to have a word with this enchantress who had cursed the entire castle. Going a little overboard, if you asked him. Apart from Crowley, everyone he had met so far had been perfectly nice.

A small chorus sounded in agreement of this latest point. “Fangs are wicked,” said another.

“Shhh!” hissed Crowley. “Stop it now, the lot of you. Or I’ll send you back to the kitchens without a glimpse of him.”

“Awwwwww,” several voices said at once.

At that moment, Crowley came stalking into view, followed by a cart with a tea service on it and four cups, all of them bouncing on top of their saucers. Aziraphale recognized one, with a blue handle and a small chip in the surface, as the one that had spoken to him earlier.

“He looks boring. Like a librarian,” said the chipped cup without one whit of guilt.

_ “Adam,”  _ said another teacup, this one with a red handle and an authoritative tone, “we mustn’t allow ourselves to fall into the trap of evaluating someone’s worth based on their appearance. Beauty and fashion are societal constructs anyway.”

“Actually,” said a third cup, then paused. “I agree with Pepper.”

“Thought you said he had fangs,” said the fourth cup, crestfallen.

“Do be quiet, dears,” the teapot said, before hopping over to Aziraphale. “You must forgive them; they haven’t seen an uncursed human in so long, you see.”

Aziraphale’s proverbial feathers had been a little ruffled, but this soothed them somewhat. “Not at all, not at all,” he said graciously, straightening his waistcoat and bowtie.

“You may call me Madame Tracy,” she continued. “I’m the housekeeper. If you need anything, just ask me and I’ll fix everything right up for you.” She barely waited for Aziraphale’s nod before continuing. “Now if you’ll excuse me, we should be getting on – don’t give me that, you’ve had your glimpse,” she said to the teacups. “Mr. Crowley wants to speak to our guest now.”

“He does?” echoed Aziraphale nervously as she hopped back to the cart and steered it out of the room. Anathema and Newton were also abandoning him; Anathema waved a candle at him before ducking out and leaving him alone with Crowley. He swallowed and took a deep breath before meeting those terrible eyes.

Except he didn’t meet the terrible eyes, because Crowley was staring determinedly at his shoes. (At least Aziraphale  _ thought  _ they were shoes. They looked awfully scaly, after all…)

Crowley cleared his throat. “This room’ll be better.”

“Yes, very much. Thank you.”

“Don’t thank me,” he nearly snarled. “I’m not doing it to be  _ nice.  _ I just… didn’t want to have to deal with you, that’s all. You’re farther away here.”

“Regardless,” said Aziraphale. He gestured at the mantel. “Are those your books?”

“I don’t read.”

Aziraphale’s face fell. “Oh.”

A full minute of painfully awkward silence ensued. Aziraphale was wondering what on earth the beast could possibly have wanted to speak to him about, since he was clearly about as far from getting to a point as Gabriel was to appreciating quality literature.

“Would you – ” Crowley began, then let out a low hiss. “Oh, it’s bloody pointless.”

Then he spun on his scaled heel and practically fled from the room before Aziraphale could say a single word. The door slammed behind him, leaving a very confused Aziraphale standing in the middle of the room.

He wondered what his life was getting to be, when this wasn’t even the strangest interaction he’d had lately.

“A little nap,” he decided out loud. “Everything will be clearer in the morning.”

He glanced out the window, at that unchanging grey sky. “Or possibly afternoon or evening,” he amended.

It was a mark of how tired he was that he didn’t even examine the books on the mantelpiece. He fell fully dressed into bed, and was asleep the instant his head hit the pillow.


	6. Gabriel

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A big thank you as always to my awesome beta notmyyacht!

At this hour of the evening, the Green Dragonfly, local inn and pub, was buzzing with activity. Not literally, despite the name and the owner's unfortunate tendency to be surrounded by a cloud of insects at all times. Certainly not because of an influx of travelers staying the night. There hadn't been a new face in town for well over ten years. No, it was bustling because Gabriel was here, and everyone wanted to be near him.

(Or maybe because it was the only pub in town, but Gabriel thought that was unrealistic and, frankly, insulting.)

He was sitting at the best table nearest the fire, playing cards with his compatriots: Sandalphon, Michael, and Uriel. He was losing badly, but it was only because he was distracted. Obviously.

"Who does he think he is, anyway?" he complained to the room at large. "Running away the day after I propose. Does he even realize how honored he is?"

"Maybe he realizzzes just fine," said Beelzebub, the proprietor and the only person in town who didn’t like Gabriel, besides Aziraphale (in secret) and the inn’s staff, Dagon, Hastur, and Ligur (very openly). They slammed a drink in front of him and stalked off.

"Ugh!" complained Gabriel, looking after them and brushing an imaginary speck of dust from his impeccable suit and scarf. "So rude. Why do we keep coming here?"

"Because the food and drinks are cheap?" Sandalphon suggested. “Since you and Beelzebub are – " Gabriel glared him into submission.

"It's the only place in town," Uriel said, which was also true and much more palatable to hear.

Calmly, Michael raked in another winning hand. Gabriel's mood continued to fall.

"He'd better come back soon," he said, frowning. "He might be too stupid to realize it, but my offer's not on the table forever.”

If word got around that Gabriel had been rejected by a penniless, fussy little bookseller, he’d be the town laughingstock. His bid to rise in the world might backfire horribly. He didn’t think Aziraphale actually had the guts to do it, but still, the possibility rankled.

Off to the side, the house musicians, Hastur and Ligur, struck up another tune, though "tune" implied it could have been mistaken for actual music. Gabriel was preparing to lose another hand when a gust of unexpectedly cold air hit him from behind. Turning, he saw that a young woman had stumbled through the doors of the inn, her clothes torn and dirty and her hair wild, as if she had been running full tilt through the woods. She looked around desperately.

"Can anybody help me?" she called. "Please! There's a beast – in a castle in the forest – "

The hum of conversation died down as more people turned to see. Beelzebub looked annoyed at this interruption of business.

"A beast?" repeated Gabriel. The woman clearly mistook this as an offer to help, and turned towards him earnestly.

"It was horrible." She shuddered. "It would have taken me prisoner if it hadn't been for that poor man."

She introduced herself as “Eve” and Gabriel had already begun to tune her out, but he returned to awareness halfway through her description of her alleged rescuer. White-blond curls, an excess of tartan… The person she was talking about was, to his enormous shock,  _ Aziraphale. _

If he hadn’t thought Aziraphale had the guts to turn him down, he definitely wouldn’t have expected this. Even now he wasn't entirely sure there hadn't been some misunderstanding. The awkward shrinking shopkeeper he knew would never have done what this woman described, at least not willingly.

Maybe it wasn't Aziraphale after all. Or maybe she was lying, or there was magic at work. Either way, a great castle lying abandoned in the middle of the forest sounded like an Opportunity worth investigating.

Mostly abandoned, he amended, if the story about the horrible beast was true as well. Then again… That could be an opportunity too.

“I’ll find him, I promise,” he said, interrupting her with a voice suddenly as sweet as honey. It was technically true. Now, whether or not he would  _ help  _ Aziraphale when he found him… That was contingent on how much he wanted to cooperate with Gabriel’s plans. He smiled widely, and his violet eyes glittered in the light of the fire. “And never fear, good lady. I’ll slay that monstrous beast myself.”

On his way back from the inn, Gabriel swung by Aziraphale’s bookshop, and then his cottage. It couldn’t hurt to verify that he hadn’t come back yet, even though he had to admit the woman’s description left little room for doubt.

The doors were locked and the windows dark. Usually Aziraphale was still awake at this hour, burning a candle low to read those ridiculous books of his. Quietly, Gabriel did a spot of trespassing and confirmed that his horse was gone as well.

As he was making his way back to the road, his attention was caught by a pale fragment of paper protruding from the door. Someone must have tried to drop a letter off but been foiled by Aziraphale’s absence, cramming their missive into the door crack to protect it from elements and nosy neighbors. But they hadn’t been quite thorough enough.

“Well, what a popular fellow you are today, Aziraphale.” Gabriel reached out and plucked it free, unfolding it.

_ Mr. A. Fell,  _ he read, skimming over the boring introductions before landing on the meat of the letter: … _ to inform you that several vessels owned by your late father, my esteemed colleague Mr. R. Fell, previously thought lost at sea for many years; namely the  _ Lady Mary  _ and the  _ Morning Star,  _ have come into port safely with their original inventory intact, as well as additional cargo.  _ Blah blah blah…  _ come as speedily as you might to direct the disposition of your new fortune; there are several business opportunities I believe would be of great interest to you in rebuilding your family’s legacy, which I would be honored to discuss with you in person… _

“Huh,” was all Gabriel said.

He pocketed the letter and went on his way.

Aziraphale’s head throbbed when he awoke. All night (or morning; the clock read eight, but he didn’t know  _ which  _ eight) he’d had dreadful dreams: rose bushes that grew and twined around his ankles, thorns stabbing into him before turning into hissing serpents with eyes made from fire; doors slamming shut and leaving him trapped alone in inky darkness forever; the tortured angel statue coming to life, turning its stone head and gazing at him with blank eyes. Gabriel and Sandalphon had been there, laughing as he tried to run and tripped, sprawling face-first into the snow.

After the nightmares, it would have been nice to have a peaceful moment upon waking, in which he could forget everything that had happened for just a little while. But it all came crashing down on him as soon as his eyes opened. He promptly screwed them shut again and pressed his face back into the pillows.

His eyes felt gritty, and his hand clenched a blanket so hard it ached. Carefully, he pried his fingers loose and flexed them.

_ It’s only a few days,  _ he reminded himself.  _ It’s only a few days. _

But he wanted to be  _ home.  _ Everything here was so strange and unfamiliar. (Although he would admit the bed was extraordinarily soft and comfortable.)

A new fear crept into his mind. What if Crowley went back on his word? He’d seemed sincere yesterday, but he was a monster and, apparently, an enchanted prince. Aziraphale was hardly an expert on dealing with either.

He groaned and pulled a blanket over his head. He didn’t want to get up and face anything just yet, so he didn’t; if time stood still here then it could stand to wait a little longer for him. Closing his eyes, he pretended that he was back in his bookshop, taking down a well-loved volume…

Then he sat up, the blanket falling off, and turned to the mantel. Last night he had been so tired he hadn’t even glanced at the titles before he fell asleep, but now he rose and went over to examine the books which had been left for him. (By whom? he wondered. Not Crowley, surely, after his terse denial of interest.)

The first one he picked up was a big book simply titled  _ Astronomy.  _ Curious, he opened it to find sprawling star charts and maps, galleries of sketched constellations, and the sparse information that could be gathered or, far more often, speculated on the nature of all the heavenly bodies.

Aziraphale paused on a chart that matched the mural painted on his ceiling, and glanced up curiously. Someone in this castle clearly had a weakness for the cosmos.

He moved onto the second volume, this one much thinner, and recognized it with delight:  _ Much Ado About Nothing.  _ Joy flooded him, such a welcome sensation after recent events that his eyes fogged with tears. Yes, it was just a book, but cracking it open here felt like he had traveled to a far-off city only to meet a childhood friend at the gates: a familiar, comfortable presence to take one’s arm and stay close through the unknown. He stroked the cover, feeling much less alone.

Clinging to this feeling, Aziraphale left the other books for the moment and sat back down on the bed, leaning back on the soft pillows and beginning  _ Much Ado About Nothing  _ from the first page. Soon enough he managed to lose himself in the story, and had nearly forgotten he was trapped in a cursed castle with a beast and a collection of talking objects. He laughed at Beatrice and Benedick’s bickering, smiled at the matchmaking antics, and cried when Benedick offered to duel his best friend for her. Not for the first time, he thought rather longingly how nice it might be to have someone like that, so loyal and brave and loving.

Gabriel’s voice rang in his head, jarring him out of the fantasy.  _ You really think someone’s going to want  _ you? How true it was. Beatrice and Benedick were beautiful and witty, and he was… well. Himself. He sighed and returned to reading. (And who needed romance when you had books, anyway?)

A short time later, Madame Tracy came by with breakfast, so Aziraphale assumed he had been correct in thinking it was morning after all. When she tapped on his door he called out he wasn't hungry, but as she rolled the cart in and the smell of fresh crisp bacon wafted to his nostrils, his stomach growled and he discovered he could, in fact, consider at least a few mouthfuls.

He downed more than a few after all; the food was delicious (it had been a while since he had been able to afford this sort of fare) and Madame Tracy chatted to him as he ate, reminding him he could explore the castle at will – except, of course, the west wing.

"I don't know," he said. "I'm quite comfortable here." He cast a dubious glance at his wrinkled clothes. "And I'm rather a mess at the moment."

True, an enchanted castle with a beastly owner was hardly high society, but Aziraphale had  _ standards. _

"Oh, just look in the wardrobe there,” she said.

He looked, and discovered it stuffed full of beautiful clothes, all in cream and white and brown and blue, and all of it tailored perfectly to fit him. His mouth dropped open slightly as he ran a finger along a blue waistcoat embroidered in white and silver. Apparently, there were upsides to being in an enchanted castle.

After breakfast, he splashed some water over his face and changed clothes, hanging his wrinkled coat up lovingly.

Then he ventured out.


	7. The Glass Galaxy

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tons of thank yous as always to my lovely beta notmyyacht!!

A few hallways down from his room, he was gripped by a wave of sudden anxiety that he wouldn't be able to find his way out or back, so first he retraced his steps from yesterday to the entrance hall. Once there and reassured of his bearings, instead of turning back into the east wing he went downstairs and took the corridor he had seen earlier, the one with light at the end.

There was a distant hum of conversation which grew louder as he went down passages and drew closer to the light, accompanied by clattering noises. He opened a door and found himself in a spacious kitchen, with an oven roaring at the far end.

Aziraphale blinked. He had to take a moment to process what he was seeing: the few people he had met so far hardly prepared him for the small army of objects that should be inanimate and were not, going about their business in the kitchen as though nothing was wrong. He saw plates and forks, and broomsticks and dusters and small pieces of furniture, all bustling back and forth.

In a corner he spotted Adam and his friends, the teacups, being scolded by a set of salt and pepper shakers. And the oven really was roaring, in a voice that seemed to wander throughout the countryside picking up accents before landing on poor Newton, shouting at him to "fetch some more kindling, laddie, before the witch’s icy grasp is allowed tae creep in and freeze us all in our beds!"

Anathema emerged from the organized chaos and hopped over to Aziraphale with a candle-wave. He had been meaning to ask her if someone could perhaps show him about the castle, but he had gotten distracted. "Pardon me, but did I hear him say witch?" he asked nervously, imagining another enchantress lurking outside waiting to cast a spell on him as soon as he left.

"Oh, that's just Shadwell," said Anathema, as though that explained everything. "Nothing to worry about, he blames witches for everything. Normal weather patterns included.”

There was an undertone in her voice which Aziraphale was too preoccupied to notice.

"Oh," he said. "Well, that's a relief. I was wondering – "

"Anathema!" someone called.

"Gotta go. Remember, stay out of the west wing!" she called as she hurried back.

Aziraphale was getting just a tiny bit frustrated at being told this every few minutes.

He made his way back to his room and began exploring in outward waves from there, occasionally going back to rest and read.

The floor on which his room was located contained only similar guest suites, though none so large or so fine as his constellation-sunrise room. Shamelessly, he scoured every one for books, but to his disappointment there were none to be found.

The floor below was where things began to get interesting. The first door he opened led to a room with nothing in it but an oversized black armchair and a dark curtain on the wall.

"How strange," he murmured, although the same thing could easily have been said about the entirety of the last few days.

There was nothing to do but sit in the chair, so that was what Aziraphale did. Then he gasped, because the curtain had drawn back to reveal an exquisite painting of a scene he would have recognized anywhere: Romeo underneath Juliet's balcony. The details were rendered with such depth and realism it seemed as if they might start moving at any moment.

In fact, when they  _ did  _ start moving, it took Aziraphale a moment to notice. He started back with a cry; but the picture moved slowly, flowing into one scene and then the next as though he was watching a very detailed play. When it was obvious nothing was going to jump out and eat him, he leaned closer again.

"Fascinating!"

Even though he couldn't hear anything the characters were saying, their expressions and his own familiarity with the story filled in the blanks. He was so enraptured by watching it play out in front of him that he nearly missed a clock chiming noon, and had to hurry back to his rooms for lunch. This arrived promptly carried by a silent footman in the shape of a hat stand. Afterwards, he returned to discover the story had paused at the moment he arose from the chair, so he was able to finish it after all.

Dabbing his handkerchief at his eyes, because Juliet weeping over her dead Romeo's body always moved him to tears, he left the room and proceeded to the next one.

This one was a wide open space with more musical instruments than Aziraphale could count packed inside. When he entered, many of them were lazily playing random melodies, all clashing and playing over each other with the discordance of an orchestra tuning up, but it fell silent as he came in.

"Do pardon me," he said, taking them for more enchanted castle denizens. "I was only exploring, you see. Carry on!"

But none of them did. Neither did they respond to him.

"Hello?" he tried. Nothing.

Perhaps they weren't people enchanted to be objects, he mused, but truly enchanted objects, like his wardrobe. He approached a pianoforte. "Excuse me," he said. "Could you play me something, please?"

Immediately, its keys pressed down and a jaunty tune began playing. Aziraphale smiled, sitting on the bench and letting his foot tap along until it was finished.

He made the same request of several other instruments with similar results, although the cello seemed inclined to play only melancholy dirges that made the sky outside seem even bleaker.

In this way, the first day was passing quicker than Aziraphale could have hoped. (Although he supposed since he had slept for quite a long time that he was now on the second day of his "imprisonment.") He discovered more curious places in the castle: a great aviary with all kinds of birds flitting about and chirping overhead, a vast empty ballroom with an intricately patterned black-and-white floor, a long hall paneled with elaborate arched mirrors. In this last one all the mirrors were broken, shattered by some unknown destructive force. Shards lay all over the floor, covered in dust and cobwebs, and jagged distortions of Aziraphale's face peered at him from all angles. He shuddered.

After that he felt he'd had enough exploring for a time, and retreated to his room for the rest of the day.

Aziraphale was sipping the remnants of his evening tea and perusing the astronomy book when there was a knock on his door.

"Come in," he called, setting the book and the tea down. He had expected Anathema or Newton or Madame Tracy, so he couldn't entirely conceal his twitch of surprise and fright when Crowley entered instead.

"Oh! Good evening," he managed.

"Yeah, uh. Evening.” The polite words were dragged kicking and screaming out of Crowley’s mouth before he tossed them roughly to Aziraphale. "I just came to…"

He caught sight of the book Aziraphale was reading and stopped, swallowing.

"You, ah." He gestured at the book. "You like that?"

"Of course," Aziraphale said rather indignantly, taking this as a judgement on his reading interests. "I read a terribly interesting account last year from a sorcerer who claimed to have teleported to Mars. Fascinating, isn’t it?" He waved a hand at the painted stars overhead. “They're so lovely, and we know so little about them really. Aren't you the – the least bit…"

_ Curious  _ faltered on his lips. Crowley was staring at him with a strange, hungry expression _ ;  _ the glowing embers in his yellow eyes died away, and in the ashes Aziraphale caught a glimpse of something he couldn’t identify, so desperate and wretched that he had to look down. His heart was suddenly beating quite fast.

"Was there something you needed?" he inquired after a moment, steadying himself.

"Yeah," Crowley said in a way that made it clear his voice was working automatically and his brain was still occupied somewhere far away.

"Yes?" Aziraphale asked politely after a few moments of silence.

"Yes!" Crowley echoed. "Right, yes. You – " He cleared his throat.

Aziraphale raised an eyebrow.

"You – will you – you'll, you'll join me for dinner!" Crowley blurted, and this time there could be no mistake; the patches of skin had turned as bright red as his scales and hair.

"Oh!" said Aziraphale, confused; he had been expecting Crowley to announce his life sentence had been renewed, or maybe that he'd be dragged to the grisly torture chambers in the west wing that Aziraphale had been envisioning. Not  _ dinner. _

"I'm, well, I'm very sorry, but I was hoping I might eat in my room again," he said as tactfully as he could. "It's been a long day, you see, and I'm very tired."  _ And also I'm still a little terrified of you and I'm sure I couldn't stomach a thing with those  _ eyes _ looking at me the whole time  _ –

He shivered a little. Crowley, though not overly burdened with eloquence or social grace, was nevertheless more sensitive than Aziraphale had believed he was. He didn't miss the shiver, or the reasons behind it. His face fell, eyes shuttered and burning once more.

"Right, course, of course," he stammered, and muttered something Aziraphale couldn't make out. "Forget I asked. Enjoy your dinner."

With that he left the room, ruined wings rustling.

When dinner came, Aziraphale did enjoy it, but he couldn't help but wonder as he ate why Crowley had wanted to dine with him. He had made it clear he considered Aziraphale a nuisance, and he didn't seem the type to concern himself overmuch with treating a guest well for propriety's sake.

Last night, he had come to see him and then left before getting to the point. Had he meant to ask him to dinner then, too?  _ Why? _

Aziraphale didn't let these questions disturb him from thoroughly savoring his dinner and dessert, but they continued gnawing at him as he got into bed that night, right up until he fell asleep.

The next morning he awoke under the impression that he'd slept dreamlessly, but that wasn't the case: he did dream once, as the sun was just peeking over the horizon in the world outside.

In his dream, a young prince dressed in black ran through a crumbling, desolate castle, every exit barred and locked before him. At last he came to a window in a tall tower, frosted with ice. Moonlight shone through, giving his bright red hair an ethereal gleam, and he raised long pale hands to beat against the window.

But it refused to give way, no matter how much he pleaded and screamed. Eventually he gave up and sagged against the wall, hands curling into fists.

He was still there, shoulders shaking with sobs, when the dream faded and Aziraphale woke up.

The next day, the final day if Crowley kept to his word, Aziraphale spent much as before. He napped a little in the morning and ate his breakfast in bed, relaxing against plump pillows and savoring the rich food. (He had grown accustomed to this finery rather quickly, and he would admit there was a part of him that would miss it when he left.) Then he spent a few hours reading, and got up around lunch to get dressed and walk around a bit.

Today he had determined to go up instead of down, and explore the floors above him. This yielded more curious finds, including an outside balcony filled with wind chimes, pealing loudly but sweetly in the wintry breeze. But the best discovery awaited him on the top floor.

When he opened the door, his breath hissed out between his teeth. At first he could hardly believe what he was seeing.

The walls were painted black as pitch. The only light came from candles placed sparingly around the room.

And hanging from the ceiling was a perfect model of the universe. The sun burned at its end, a suspended glass orb with fire dancing within, and all of the planets surrounded it, spinning silently in their never-ending orbit. They were all blown glass, colors swirled and caught underneath their surfaces and lending them form and texture. All around him were stars of opal and diamond, glittering with reflected candlelight; there was a nebula drawn with a ribbon of amethysts; there, a comet of icy crystal floating past. From above him came a soft whirring, the mechanical workings of this miniature sky.

Here was the opposite of the mirrors he had found shattered downstairs. That was destruction, careless and raw; this was artistry, this was  _ creation.  _ Someone watched over this place, kept the sun's fire stoked and fed, fixed the workings, cared for the miniature planets and stars with infinite tenderness; they were so delicate that surely they would require an equally delicate touch.

Aziraphale doubted a candelabra or a clock would be able to accomplish such a feat, even if they were very nimble candelabras and clocks. Of course, there was only one person here who could do it, and Aziraphale had known who it was as soon as he had stepped inside.

He stared around him in awe, taking in the beauty of the universe as Crowley saw it, crafted it. It didn’t seem possible, that such a fierce and monstrous creature should be capable of recognizing such loveliness, let alone recreating it, but here he was. He reached out to touch a set of twin stars, placed so that candlelight shone right through them and fractured into brilliant sparks, before snatching his hand back quickly.

He shouldn't be here. Anathema might have told him he had free run of the castle except for the west wing, but there was something terribly intimate about this place; he was an interloper, an intrusion into Crowley's imitation of a night sky he could no longer see.  _ Bumbling  _ was what Gabriel had called him, and it was true. He didn't belong in the midst of this fragile, crystalline spiderweb of beauty – he would knock over one of the lovely glass planets, or twist up the strings of stars. This wasn't his to ruin; it wasn't even his to look at.

Aziraphale turned around and hurriedly shut the door on the glimmering stars.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Quick note: after this chapter I'll be shifting to posting once every two weeks. I haven't been getting through editing the remainder of the chapters quite as quickly as I'd like, haha, and hopefully that will give me the extra time I need. Thank you for reading! <3


	8. The West Wing

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HUGE thank you to my amazing beta notmyyacht! <3

That night, when Crowley stopped by to ask him to dinner, Aziraphale accepted.

This time he didn’t even give Crowley a chance to fail at asking him to dinner and then flee; as soon as his mouth opened and a stuttering “will you” forced its way out, Aziraphale said, “Yes.”

Crowley’s jaw dropped, giving him a nice, accurate, and highly unsettling view of the razor-sharp fangs and a forked tongue. Through sheer force of will, Aziraphale kept his smile steady. Though he had made up his mind to accept out of curiosity, to see if he could make sense of the puzzle that was Crowley, his own forwardness took even him by surprise.

“Yes, thank you,” he repeated. Tacking on extra politeness was a tried-and-true method of masking his social awkwardness. “I look forward to it. How formally shall I dress?”

Crowley’s jaw dropped even further. Aziraphale was beginning to worry that it would unhinge and fall to the floor when he finally mustered up an answer.

“It’sssssssss fine. I mean… whatever you want. It’s fine. See you then?”

Without waiting for an answer, he vanished.

“I see what Adam meant,” Aziraphale told his wardrobe. He found himself smiling. “He  _ is  _ rather shy, isn’t he?”

Newton appeared at his door a little while later to announce dinner was ready, and guided him downstairs to the dining room. This was on the ground floor, down one of the passages Aziraphale hadn’t explored yet. Clearly it had been designed with more than two people in mind. The table, claw-footed and made of a wood so dark it was almost black, stretched absurdly long. If there was a horizontal equivalent to vertigo, Aziraphale felt it looking down the length of the room.

There was a fire near the seat Newton showed him to. Crowley slouched at the far end close to another fire, in a high-backed chair that had sections cut roughly out of the arms for his wings to drape over. He was talking in a low voice to Anathema, who stood on the table in front of him. It was difficult to tell, but Aziraphale thought that  _ he  _ had changed into something more formal; still black, but sleeker. His scales looked blood-red in the light of the fire, and his claws looked very sharp indeed. Aziraphale swallowed.

He took his seat at the other end of the table, while he tried not to be too obvious about trying to listen to Crowley and Anathema’s conversation. It was just loud enough for him to pick up.

“What do I  _ do?”  _ Crowley sounded mildly panicked.

“Be charming. But be yourself.”

“I can’t be both at the same time!” he hissed.

Anathema looked over her metal shoulder before turning back to Crowley. “Shh, he’s here. Just go with the flow. I’ll take care of everything.”

She left the table and disappeared through a side door, followed by Newton. Crowley and Aziraphale were left alone at opposite ends of the huge table.

Neither of them seemed inclined to break the silence. Crowley slumped back against his wings and stared glumly at the table, tracing the wood grain with his eyes rather than look up at Aziraphale. Aziraphale himself was looking anywhere  _ but  _ the table and Crowley.

Now that he was here, he was beginning to regret his decision to come down to dinner. However curious he was, about Crowley and the castle and the stars on the top floor, it wasn’t worth jeopardizing the deal he had made. He shouldn’t have rocked the boat, as it were. He should have just had a nice quiet dinner in his room and left tomorrow as they had agreed, and never looked back. Every time he accidentally looked at Crowley, all he could see were the terrible claws and fangs that could tear him apart in an instant. (Then he remembered the planets upstairs, gently cared for and cherished, and he felt more at ease – but still nervous.)

Just as things were getting unbearably awkward, a troupe of servers filed in and began laying dishes in front of them, which did an excellent job of distracting him. If he had thought the food good before, it was nothing compared to the banquet before him now: beef ragout, cheese soufflé, pie and pudding on flambé… and some sort of grey stuff which Aziraphale couldn’t identify, but was absolutely  _ delicious. _

About halfway through the meal, the hat stand footman came back in bearing one of the enchanted violins from the music room.

“Oh no,” Crowley could be heard muttering. “Oh no, Anathema what did you  _ do –  _ ”

The violin began playing.

Aziraphale stopped eating to listen. It was a gorgeous piece: the melody rising, falling,  _ aching,  _ but with such tender sweetness… He sighed, momentarily transported by the music.

“How lovely,” he said, and beamed at Crowley. “Do you have music played every night at dinner?”

“Ngk,” said Crowley, and shoved a spoonful of grey stuff into his mouth.

His wings quivered as though he were a caged, frightened animal. Really, one would have thought  _ Aziraphale  _ was the dreadful beast here. On that note:

“Er, Crowley, I’ve been wondering…” he began.

A noise rather like steam escaping from a teakettle came out of Crowley. (The reason, which Aziraphale would not discover for quite some time, was that it was the first time he had spoken Crowley’s name out loud and he hadn’t been at all prepared.)

Aziraphale fixed a curious look on him, but he shook himself and jerked his head.

“Go on then.”

“Well.” Aziraphale adjusted his position in the chair. “Not to, you know, toot my own horn! Haha. But I’m rather an expert on ancient tomes, and over the years I’ve run into quite a few volumes on magic and witchcraft and the like.”

“Do you have a point, angel?”

“Why yes, as a matter of fact,” said Aziraphale, irritated by the interruption even if he’d said that ridiculous nickname differently this time, a softer kind of amused and not really mocking at all. “If you would stop being rude for ten seconds. I was about to offer to  _ help.” _

Crowley blinked, slowly. So slowly that it made Aziraphale realize how very little he had blinked before.

“Help,” he repeated.

“Yes.” Aziraphale nodded, pleased with himself and ignoring the way Crowley’s voice had gone oddly hollow. “I can do a bit of research when I go back home, see if I can find anything about the witch who cursed you, or ways you might be able to break the spell… I don’t suppose she left an instruction manual?” He chuckled at his own joke.

Crowley was still staring at him. “Help,” he said yet again, as if he didn’t quite know what the word meant. Then all of a sudden he let out a snort of laughter. It wasn’t a  _ happy  _ kind of laughter. It was hard and bitter, and it made Aziraphale stiffen, smile dying away.

“Oh, trust me, there’s nothing you can do. Don’t bother, yeah? Waste of time.  _ Big  _ waste of time. Just go back to your – whatever it was you did before turning to a life of trespassing and rose thievery.”

“I own a bookshop, perfectly respectable I assure you. And the gate was open!” Aziraphale protested. Crowley dismissing him out of hand had stung a bit more than he cared to admit. “You can’t possibly say for sure that I can’t help at all.”

“Yes, I can,” Crowley said. He gestured while he spoke, obsidian claws flashing in the firelight. “All the research you would do, I’ve had it done already, or done it myself. There’s only one way to break this curse, and it’s – ” He stuttered to a halt, his mouth opening and closing. When he did continue, it was in a quiet voice, half to himself.

“Not gonna happen. Stupid of me to think it would, really.”

Aziraphale tried to keep being offended, but Crowley looked so  _ sad  _ that he couldn’t really muster up any more righteous anger. His wings were drooping, for heaven’s sake.

“I  _ am  _ sorry,” he said at last. He was burning with curiosity about what the “one way” was, but Crowley plainly didn’t want to discuss it.

Crowley waved a hand. “It’s alright, angel.” Then, muttering with clear difficulty: “...Kind of you to offer.”

Oh, he’d said “angel” that way again, all soft and casual. True, he was probably only saying it because Aziraphale’s actual name was hard to remember or pronounce, but still. He rather liked it like this.

“Ssssssssso! Bookshop?” said Crowley in a valiant attempt to change the subject. Aziraphale had heard less desperate tones from dying men. “You, uh, run into a lot of occult books then?”

“Oh, a fair few,” Aziraphale said, preening. Ah, perhaps a touch of humor would help defuse the situation. “You’d be surprised at the things I’ve uncovered. Why, I could probably summon a demon right into my bookshop!”

Crowley stared at him. Abruptly, Aziraphale remembered the “some people call me a demon” thing.

“Oh dear,” he said. “Oh dear, I didn’t mean…”

Crowley’s lips twisted into a sardonic smile. “Hell is empty, and all the devils are here?”

“Oh yes, quite! No! I mean, not quite! You’re not a devil, of course, how terribly rude… That is, I would never imply…” Aziraphale ran aground on the conversational rocks and floundered.

Now Crowley’s smile looked less bitter, though sad once more. “Relax, will you? I’m not gonna – don’t worry about offending me. I’ve heard worse than anything you could come up with.”

Aziraphale was abruptly and unpleasantly reminded of his encounters with Gabriel, who always seemed to have some new insult ready to hand for usage on him. He cleared his throat, and managed to stumble through a sort of thanks/apology.

“And do let me know if you change your mind. I’d be happy to do anything I could.”

“I won’t.”

Aziraphale frowned.

“Are you about to call me rude again?”

“Er… possibly.”

Crowley laughed, and Aziraphale realized two things. Firstly, that it was a rather nice laugh and he wouldn’t have minded hearing it again. Secondly, that it turned out he wasn’t quite as afraid of Crowley as he had thought.

The brusque rejection of his offer was still nagging at the back of his mind when he left dinner. (Which had continued to be an awkward mess, but improved slightly by the time they were finished. Crowley had laughed and called him “angel” again, several times. Aziraphale blamed the wine for the warmth in his cheeks.)

Crowley couldn’t  _ know  _ he wouldn’t be able to do any good, surely. And even if he had given up hope for himself, he must still want to find a way to break the curse for the other innocent people who lived here.

Emboldened by the fact that dinner hadn’t been a complete disaster, Aziraphale paused on the landing and glanced right. No doubt that was where Crowley’s lair was located, and perhaps some clues as to the nature of his enchantment.

It would be for Crowley’s own good, he argued to himself. For everyone here, really. Aziraphale was not ordinarily a self-confident person, but if there was one thing he knew he was good at, it was reading. He felt sure Crowley hadn’t done as thorough of research as he, Aziraphale, would do. Surely another go at convincing him couldn’t hurt. And if he could satisfy his curiosity at the same time, so much the better.

Making up his mind, he turned right on the landing and ascended the steps.

To the west wing.

His courage carried him approximately twelve steps down the hall before evaporating into the void, but he continued on all the same.

So far, the only notable aspect of the west wing was that it was a dustier, gloomier version of the east wing. Cobwebs stretched over the corridors, and there were no fires lit in any of the rooms. It was dreadfully cold. Aziraphale hugged himself, pulling the thick, finely tailored coat he had pulled out of the wardrobe this morning closer.

Further down, there were paintings hung on the walls. He looked up at them as he passed, and shivered; all the faces had been scratched out, claw marks gouged deep into the canvas. All except one, the farthest down: a woman standing with a couple of other people who had been carved away. Her face was serious, but there was a twinkle in her eyes. Her hair was flaming red.

At the end of the hallway, he finally saw the glow of light, but it wasn’t firelight or candlelight. It was too cold and pale. It drew him in, down the corridor, until he reached a door that was hanging off its hinges.

Beyond the door was what had once been a study. A large telescope stood at one of the windows, though it was rusted with disuse and covered in more dust and webs. The rest of the place was a wreck, broken furniture strewn about, scraps of paper and cloth fluttering about in a breeze despite the closed windows. A sort of nest of torn up blankets and coats lay next to the telescope.

Aziraphale swallowed. Was this where Crowley  _ slept? _

He turned slowly. To his right, on a small table, was the source of the light.

It was a rose, though unlike any rose he had ever seen before. It floated in a glass case, shining with a spectral glow. While the light was pale and nearly colorless, the petals were a deep blood-red, shot through with black.

Aziraphale had a tendency to kill every plant he touched, but even his limited botanical expertise was enough to tell him this rose was dying. Most of the petals had fallen off already. They had turned completely black, carpeting the bottom of the case in velvety darkness. Even as he watched, another one wavered, about to fall.

Without thinking, he reached out to prop it back up somehow. He lifted off the glass cover and a faint breeze ruffled the petals, tugging at them. His hand reached towards it...

A wordless cry sounded from behind him. Crowley elbowed him aside and blocked him from the rose, snatching the cover and slipping it back on. He cradled the case against his body.

“What are you  _ doing?”  _ he snarled. “You were told not to come here!”

Startled, Aziraphale took a step back, raising his hands placatingly. “I’m sorry! I didn’t mean to upset you – ”

“Upsssssssset me? You could have killed me!”

Aziraphale’s mouth dropped open. “I... ”

Crowley set the case back on the table gingerly, his hands trembling. But it was too late; the faint gust of air had been too much. Within the case, the petal Aziraphale had tried to catch gave way at last, floating down and settling against the others. For a moment, the rose’s light flickered.

A sudden booming rumble echoed through the castle, and the ground shook. Aziraphale was thrown off balance; he stumbled towards the wall, catching himself against it. Crowley launched himself at the rose, no doubt to wrap himself around it protectively once more, but halfway there he let out another cry and fell to his knees, body crumpling in pain.

Another tremor; pieces of the castle wall crumbled off in Aziraphale’s fingers as he clutched at it, trying to keep himself upright. Crowley was letting out an agonized keen, curling in on himself as though the quakes were physical blows.

Then it was over: the light returned, the ground steadied, and Crowley stumbled to his feet. He was shaking all over.

“I – did I – ” whispered Aziraphale. He couldn’t finish the question. Had  _ he  _ done that? “Are you all right?”

Slowly, painfully, Crowley turned to him. There were tears at the corners of his eyes and trickling down his cheeks; they glimmered like lamplight through glass as his eyes flared in the darkened study. His wings spread out, tattered feathers gusting through the air. Right then, with shadows wrapped around him and eyes burning through the dark, he looked every inch the monstrous beast. Aziraphale stood frozen, simultaneously battling the instinct to step back and a very stupid urge to walk  _ forward  _ instead, to see if Crowley was alright, offer him a handkerchief to wipe away the molten tears. But of course that would never be welcomed, not after he had caused this.

“Leave,” Crowley hissed. “Now.” In the silence after the earthquake, his whisper seemed to reverberate through the air with the force of a shout. 

“I didn’t mean to – ”

_ “Get out!” _

Aziraphale turned, too ashamed to argue, and staggered out.

Behind him, Crowley wavered and fell once more to his knees.


	9. Fangs, Razor Sharp Ones

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always, a HUGE thank you to my amazing beta notmyyacht!! <33 Enjoy!

Tears blurred Aziraphale’s eyes as he hurried down the corridors. He was back in the entrance hall in no time, passing Anathema and Newton, who were sitting on top of a table playing chess.

“Where are you going?” Anathema called.

“Away from here!” He wanted to stop and apologize to her, to all of them, but he could still hear Crowley’s voice echoing in his ears.

“Wait!” she cried after him, but he paid her no heed.

Snow was falling as he wrenched the doors open and ran outside. He was glad of the thick coat, even if he felt a pang realizing that he was leaving his own behind forever. He’d had it for so long…

Aziraphale descended the stairs as fast as he dared, slipping on the freshly fallen snow, and went into the stables where he’d first left Rosalind upon coming to the castle. There she was, munching contentedly on some hay.

He saddled her hastily, ignoring the look she was giving him from the one eye he could see. “We’re leaving,” he told her.

She shook her head, whinnying.

“I’m sorry, dear girl, but we have to! Crowley – ” Aziraphale abruptly realized she would have no idea who Crowley was. He didn’t know why, but the thought caught at him and pulled painfully. “We’re not welcome here anymore.”

She still didn’t believe him, or maybe she disagreed with him, but he didn’t have time to argue. He climbed into the saddle and urged her out of the stable.

He had spent enough time looking out the castle windows that he had a pretty clear idea of the grounds’ layout. Avoiding the rose garden, they retraced their original path to the castle until they arrived at the wrought-iron gate.

Rosalind shied back at the threshold as Aziraphale pulled it open.

“No, I’m sorry, we can’t go back,” he said firmly. “I know it’s frightening out there, but just think, we’ll be home soon.”

Once again, she turned back towards the castle.

_ “Really  _ home,” said Aziraphale, tugging the reins back around and mentally cursing whatever stablehand had given her so many treats that she was this attached to the castle. “You back in your nice cozy stall, and me back in my bookshop. Won’t that be nice?”

Blowing her breath out, she finally went through the gate. Aziraphale looked back as it swung shut with a clang, wishing he could have left under better circumstances. He had the strangest feeling that once he was gone this would all seem like a distant dream. He blinked hard and turned away.

Try as he might, he couldn’t make her go any faster than a walk once they were off the castle grounds. She picked her way through the forest, ears forward, alert to any sound from the nearby brush. Apparently, wolves were still on her mind.

Aziraphale had something else on his. He had just spotted the fallen tree where he had dropped the satchel containing  _ Romeo and Juliet.  _ Was it possible that it was still there? He had to check, didn’t he? Then at least no matter how unpleasant this adventure had ended up being, he wouldn’t have lost one of his treasures to it.

Pulling Rosalind to a halt, he dismounted over her frantic protests. He went over to where he thought the book had landed and pushed around the snow that had fallen over the last few days. Then, breath catching, he spotted brown leather under the snow.

Gleefully, he snatched it out and pressed it to his chest. Oh, what a relief! Maybe this was a sign – that he could put this entire affair behind him and go on with his life.

He hoped the book hadn’t been too damaged. He’d waterproofed the satchel, so it should have been safe from the snow, but it hadn’t been made to endure three days of exposure. He would check it over when he returned, yes, and he would sell a different book to pay his bills, he couldn’t part with this one now…

These thoughts swirling through his head, he only made it halfway back to Rosalind before the first howl echoed through the forest.

His blood froze. Fear filled him from head to toe, making his movements clumsy as he dashed back to her. More howls sounded around him, close now. His foot slipped once more in the snow as he tried to get in the saddle; he fell backward, and something snarled in the space where he had just been.

With a cry, Aziraphale scrambled back on his hands, away from the wolf that had appeared before him. Its jaws were open and slavering, and it was looking between him and Rosalind, no doubt deciding which of them would be tastiest.

“Get away!” Aziraphale cried, waving his hands. “Go! Shoo!”

The wolf tilted its head, possibly wondering why he thought this would be effective. Then it sprang.

Rosalind’s hooves came down hard on its head as it lunged towards Aziraphale; it snarled, lurching off course, and turned. Aziraphale scrambled up and seized a nearby fallen tree branch. It was hardly an ideal weapon, but it was thick and heavy and better than nothing.

He swung it at the wolf as it jumped at them again, the branch connecting hard. This time the wolf let out a whimper and ran off.

“Yes, that’s right!” Aziraphale called after it, twirling the branch. “No match for you and I, eh Rosalind?” He turned around and his face fell.

“Oh,  _ fuck.” _

Half a dozen more wolves had come prowling out of the forest, blocking their path home, and there were more in the forest if the howls all around were anything to go by. They eyed Aziraphale with a menace that didn’t seem entirely natural, although it was possible that his terrified mind was imagining it.

He looked at Rosalind, only a few feet away but too far to reach before the wolves caught up to him. “I am very sorry, dear girl, for getting us into this mess. But remember, you can run a great deal faster than I can, so if you see an opening, please do take it.”

She snorted derisively.

“Thank you,” he said softly.

The wolf on the far left of the semi-circle leapt forward. Aziraphale swung at it and missed, stumbling aside as it snapped for him, and aimed again. This time it struck the wolf, but another one was already there. It caught the branch in its teeth and worried at it, trying to wrench it from Aziraphale’s hands.

He held on desperately, aware of Rosalind kicking and rearing a short distance away. Another wolf went scurrying back into the forest, and for a moment Aziraphale thought maybe they really did stand a chance.

Then another one joined the tugging match and yanked the branch out of his hands. It went skittering away into the underbrush, landing with a hollow thunk against the same tree trunk he had fished  _ Romeo and Juliet  _ out from. Three wolves advanced on him, eyes gleaming.

Aziraphale was defenseless now. He chanced a glance behind him and saw that two more had cut him off from Rosalind and were harrying her, driving her further away. Swallowing, he turned back to the other three in front of him.

He felt frantically for another weapon, even though he knew it was futile; all he had left was the book satchel over his shoulder, which wasn’t heavy enough to be of use. Perhaps if he could make it to the trees just off the path, he could find another branch or a stone or something. All he could really do now was run, so that was what he did.

He barely made it three steps before something heavy slammed into his back, forcing him down. Snow blinded him, getting in his face and mouth, as he crashed face-first onto the ground. He rolled away as a wolf snapped at him, and all it caught was his coat, tearing a long gash in it. Aziraphale pushed himself up by his hands – 

And went sprawling backwards as another wolf collided with his chest. It crawled on top of him, the heaviness of its body pressing him down into the ground, and opened its mouth, growling. Its claws dug into his arm, gripping, raking across the skin. Blood spilled into the snow.

Saliva dripped down onto him. Its breath stank horribly of its last kill, and Aziraphale’s eyes watered. He tried to move, but he couldn’t; all he could do was clench his fist and ineffectually batter at the wolf’s side. It didn’t even connect. His arms were pinned fast, and he was too light-headed to put any force behind it.

The wolf opened its maw.

Aziraphale squeezed his eyes shut. He knew he should be praying, or his life should be flashing before his eyes, or something deep and meaningful like that – but all he could think of was how very, very much he didn’t want to die. Especially not like this.

_ Pathetic,  _ said a little voice inside his head.  _ What a coward. Can’t even face death with dignity. _

He sobbed once, because he  _ was  _ a coward, he was useless, he was going to die uselessly – and then, abruptly, the weight and the stinking breath of the wolf were gone. There was a snarl nearby, and then another snarl, in a different pitch: one that to his shock he recognized.

His eyes flew open.

Crowley had come out of nowhere and tackled the wolf, rolling over the ground with it in a blur of black wings and matted fur. He raised one hand, going to slash at it with his claws, but it sank its teeth into his shoulder and he let out a howl of his own.

Aziraphale flinched, but Crowley wasn’t quite so easy to dispatch as all that, and kept struggling. He seemed to realize he could use his wings; instead of flailing around helplessly, one lifted and curled up, beating at the wolf and blinding it. That time he did manage to land a blow with his claws; they dug into the wolf’s side and he hurled it off him and away into the forest.

Another one jumped on top of him immediately afterwards. Crowley twisted aside, its teeth grazing over his neck instead of landing in his shoulder or biting his head off. But he cried out in pain anyway, and Aziraphale realized that it had torn at one of the chunks of scales that wasn’t merged well with his skin, peeling it back and ripping the existing wound in the process. Blood welled from his neck, streaming down and joining the blood already gushing from the bite in his shoulder.

It shook Aziraphale out of the daze he’d been in. Quavering, he got to his feet and dived for another branch, hefting it even though he wasn’t entirely sure he could walk in a straight line at the moment, let alone hit something he aimed at.

Turning around, he saw Crowley had managed to heave the wolf away from him and was upright once more, staggering over to block Aziraphale from the remaining members of the pack. His wings flared out, and he growled at the wolves. His fangs glinted in the starlight. Out here in the normal world, his eyes seemed even more  _ wrong,  _ now fully yellow and glowing like coals. Blood dripped from his neck and shoulder and claws, landing in the snow at his feet. He snarled again, raising those wicked claws, and the wolves turned tail and ran.

Crowley looked just the same as he had back at the castle: terrible, deadly,  _ inhuman.  _ But this time Aziraphale wasn’t afraid in the slightest. He went to stand next to him, wobbling on unsteady legs.

“Sssssssorry for the delay,” Crowley said, breathing hard. “Can’t actually fly with, with…” He jerked a thumb at his wings. “Inconvenient, y’know.”

Then, before Aziraphale could labor too long over the idea that Crowley had really been rather  _ impressive  _ just now, Crowley fell over into the snow.

“Oh dear,” he breathed, collapsing next to him. Dimly, he was aware that Rosalind had made her way to him again and was nuzzling at Crowley’s uninjured shoulder. (A corner of Aziraphale’s mind wondered why she was so affectionate towards him, when she had never met him before.)

“Angel, look,” He pointed upwards, or tried to point upwards; his hand flopped onto the ground weakly. A beatific smile graced his monstrous face. There, visible through a gap in the canopy, were stars, dotted throughout the sky and twinkling down at them.

“I haven’t seen them in… ssssssso long…” His eyes drifted closed, head lolling to one side.

Panic spiked in Aziraphale’s chest. “Oh, oh, wake up! Please don’t die because of me!” he begged.

“I’ll be fine,” Crowley mumbled. “Just need to get back… before…” All of a sudden his body contracted. His skin  _ rippled,  _ more thick patches of scales bubbling and forming as Aziraphale watched, gaping. Something in one of his wings cracked, the sound piercing the night air, and he let out another cry.

“What is it?” Aziraphale asked desperately. “What’s happening?”

“I can’t – leave the castle – ” Crowley was writhing on the ground. His mouth opened and closed, but nothing more came out except choked whimpers.

Aziraphale took a deep breath and shoved himself to his feet, reaching down and catching one of Crowley’s flailing arms. “We’ll get you back, won’t we Rosalind?”

She gave an enthusiastic neigh, bending down so that Aziraphale could sling Crowley over her back before standing.

“Get him to the castle,” Aziraphale told her. “I’ll follow on foot.”

“The wolvesssss,” Crowley slurred, panicked; from the pain this time, Aziraphale thought, not the latent hiss.

“You’ve scared them off very effectively, I should think. We’re not far from the gate. I’ll be fine.” He said this with more confidence than he felt, but Crowley seemed to be in bad shape, so it wasn’t as though he had another option. He had just saved Aziraphale’s life; surely the least Aziraphale could do to repay him was be brave for a few minutes.

Rosalind took off.

“Well,” said Aziraphale to the empty forest, and straightened his ruined coat. He picked up the branch again, wishing it was a real weapon. A light source might have been nice, too; Crowley’s stars were beautiful, but not of much practical use.

Shivering, he set off towards the castle gate.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> After this chapter I'm afraid I'm going to have to take a hiatus from this fic for a while. I'm really, REALLY sorry to do this (I was hoping to avoid it by writing ahead ;_;) and I want to stress that I'm not abandoning it - it's still completely drafted, I only need to find the time + motivation to edit it, which I just... haven't had lately. To be honest I think the chapter deadlines might be making me freeze up since I'm not used to it haha, though the more likely culprit is that there's also a TON of stress going on IRL at the moment and I have very very limited fic energy, and what there is has mostly been going to comfort fic instead. Anyway, I'm hoping that taking a break will help with both of those issues and I'll be able to come back and turn out something better than if I tried to force it through. Thank you to everyone who's been reading this and/or saying nice things about it, I really really appreciate it <33


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